


Echoes of Velvets

by ospreyx



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Blood and Injury, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Heavy Angst, Implied Suicide Attempt, Major Character Injury, STRQ Week 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-29
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:34:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28410072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ospreyx/pseuds/ospreyx
Summary: Once upon a time, they were thought to be inseparable.But now, with a decade under their belt and the bonds that were once there now torn at the seams, it occurs to Qrow that not all good things were made to last.
Relationships: Qrow Branwen & Raven Branwen, Qrow Branwen & Raven Branwen & Summer Rose & Taiyang Xiao Long, Qrow Branwen & Summer Rose, Qrow Branwen & Taiyang Xiao Long, Raven Branwen & Summer Rose, Raven Branwen & Taiyang Xiao Long, Summer Rose & Taiyang Xiao Long
Comments: 10
Kudos: 17





	1. confessions/promises

**Author's Note:**

> just a little something to get myself out of this writing slump i've fallen into ♡
> 
> this fic is a short series of vaguely chronological stories that will cover days 3 & 4 and 6 & 7 of strq week. we will be jumping between beacon-era strq and pre-canon, post-kids strq (or what's left of them). as per the week guidelines, nothing shippy happens on-screen, but the vibes are there if you squint hard enough.
> 
> content warnings will be in the author's notes of each chapter. prompts will be in the chapter titles.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the promises qrow has made over the years and the ones he could not keep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: roofies & major character injury

No one could have ever warned Qrow that it would turn out this way.

It starts when Beacon does. It starts with the two of them, one and the same so long ago. It starts with him and his twin, back when she was all he had and he was all she knew how to protect. They were two halves of one whole, side by side in an unfamiliar place with unfamiliar faces and an unfamiliar kindness shown to them by a man who would later give them wings.

Everything is unfamiliar, everything but Raven. Everything but her voice nearby, asking him a question, one that he does not hear over the pounding in his ears. But he knows what it is that she asks, and of course, he promises to come find her before anyone else.

Qrow is not one to make promises that he cannot keep, but Beacon was the start of many things, and broken promises was one of them. Beacon was the start of a crack within the foundation, thin and spindly like lightning within a nebulous sky from the day they arrived.

They were one and the same, side by side until they were not, until they were finally separated at Beacon. Until there was distance between them, filled with leaves spattered like blood and trees thicker than any they have ever seen back at home. Qrow is nothing if not determined, and so is his twin, and if there is one thing he will always do, it is carry out his end of the promise.

But then he runs into Taiyang, and Raven quite literally crashes into Summer, and nothing is the same from that point onwards.

* * *

(Once upon a time, they were identical.

But now, with Raven’s glare sharper than Omen’s edge and her words more lethal than the curve of Harbinger’s blade, it occurs to Qrow that change is an inevitability.

They argue like they always do - quiet, lethal, dragging on until Summer finally snaps at them to give it a rest, but something feels different this time. Something feels off, just as it does when she sits by the window for hours at a time or when she disappears into Ozpin’s office without another word. Something is fundamentally different, because this time, she does not try to convince him.

From the very start, he promised he would not leave her behind.

He should have known that she would be the one to leave instead.)

* * *

At first, Qrow does not recognize it.

It starts slowly, fraying the edges of his vision and dripping gradually into his veins. It starts with a drink a nameless blond bought for him and a few pretty words, and then something finally _gives_.

Warm lights burn against his eyes - perhaps it is the cosmos itself, whirling, dancing, far too bright for him to see through. He gets up on two uneven feet, tells himself to move, begs himself to move, but he blinks between one eternity and the next, and suddenly he is no longer at the bar. 

He does not know where he is. He does not care, because when he opens his eyes, it is dark, and his senses are full of endless oceans and golden sunflowers and everlasting sunlight. He glances upwards as best as he can, feels the arms around him, the skin beneath his cheek cold enough to burn.

He hears Summer’s voice first. Then, he hears Taiyang, angry and seething and everything that Qrow wishes he would not be. Angry, so angry, and Qrow wonders why, wonders how Taiyang can be so angry, wonders what exactly he is angry at. Wonders how he can stay so angry, because Raven was angry as well, Raven was angry earlier and now he’s here and he doesn’t even know where _here_ is.

He wonders where Raven is. Wonder why she left, where she went, why she always leaves to places where she knows he cannot find her. Wonders where she is, why would she go, where did she go, where is she and why isn’t she here and why hasn’t Taiyang brought her back?

Lost in oceans deep are footsteps, and it occurs to him with a jumpstart between his ribs that Summer is gone. Summer is gone and so is Raven and he wishes they wouldn’t leave, wishes he could come with them. He squirms, turns his head, and his bones rattle, veins burn, skin scalds where his arms wrap desperately around Taiyang’s neck.

That is the only anchor he has, the only thing keeping him from drowning, his voice a distant slur as he hears himself say, “Tai?”

Taiyang responds, but the words do not filter. Qrow lurches, moves his hands to fist weakly in Taiyang’s shirt, clings desperately even when his head finally hits something soft and cold.

“Qrow,” Taiyang gently starts. His hands are loose around Qrow’s wrists, pulling, asking him to let go. To let himself drown. To let the only person he has left leave him. “We’re gonna find out who -”

“Don’t,” Qrow gasps, or he thinks he does, thinks his eyes start to sting when he rambles on, “don’t. Don’t go. Don’t leave. Don’t, don’t -”

Taiyang’s grip tightens, and Qrow thinks he still pleads, thinks he still begs. Thinks and thinks but nothing sticks, nothing registers, nothing but the spiraling atmosphere and the whirling cosmos and the earth that veers further from the sun. Further and further until he blinks against silence, against an abyss, against something soft against his cheek and a hand that weaves soothingly through his hair.

“Okay,” he thinks Taiyang says against the crown of his head. Soft and raw, like a promise, like a loss, like a heart that lays bleeding. “Okay. I won’t.”

* * *

(Once upon a time, they were infallible.

But now, with Taiyang miles away in his own head and the world spinning too quickly around them, it occurs to Qrow that even they can make mistakes.

He wonders idly, solemnly, as he raises his flask with one shaking hand and burns his throat anew, how they got this way. He wonders what happened to Taiyang, where his summertime smile went, how the light in his eyes might return from the fading tide. He wonders what happened to Summer, silent for the first time in her life, a quietude that Qrow knows was wrought from words too sharp and a promise broken to her, as well.

He wonders what happened to himself, when his vision begins to slide out of focus and his legs refuse to work after some time.)

* * *

Some promises are not long term, but they certainly feel like they are.

A promise for the next few minutes at most, that much Qrow knows, but knowing does not make it feel as short as it is. Knowing does not make this century go by any quicker, kept track of only by the steady trickle of crimson against the ground. Drip by steady drip, almost black where it muddles with dirt, brighter than embers sparking to life where it seeps into Qrow’s shirt.

Omen tears through the veil, and Raven makes an odd noise, sways on her feet while her Aura shimmers but does not break. “Stay there. Keep him from moving,” she tells him, even if it is the one thing he never wants to hear from her, even if she knows that it is the last thing he can reliably do. “Don’t follow. _Don’t_ ,” she adds when he opens his mouth, sharper than Harbinger at his side, deeper than the splotches of purple mottled black down Taiyang’s chest.

Perhaps once upon a time, he would not have listened. Once upon a time he would have followed, because how could he know that she would be back, how could he ever know that he would not be forgotten?

But then he glances downwards to Taiyang’s head in his lap. He sees the red that quickly froths and spills from the corners of Taiyang’s lips, hears the shallow breaths that are now accompanied by a wet rattle. He knows why Raven asks him to stay. Knows she will be back, knows that she is only trying to find Summer, but knowing does not make the fear any less irrational.

Knowing does nothing to stop him from quaking harder, because this is not his job, this was never his job. Summer is the one who holds them together, Summer is the one who keeps them from falling apart, but Summer is gone and Raven will be soon and Qrow was never prepared for this.

Frantically, he starts, “How do you know I’ll -”

“Stay,” Raven snaps, raggedly, brokenly, for once talking to him like he is her brother and not her obligation. “No matter what, _stay_ , and make sure that idiot doesn’t move.”

She does not leave yet. Not until he agrees, no until he _promises_. She knows him more than he knows himself, knows that he will stay if he says he will, even when everything in his being tells him to run. Even when he trembles almost hard enough to tear apart at the seams, because he knows she is right - knows that no one else is there to keep Taiyang from drowning, and knows that Taiyang would do the same for him.

They all would. Raven would, Summer would. This closely intertwined with one another, this seamlessly weaved into one coherent whole, they all would go through hell and back for one another. It never occurs to Qrow until then how true that is. It never hits him until he is finally the one who has to stay behind, because despite the fear that runs white-hot in his veins, he still _knows_ they will come back.

Wordlessly, Qrow nods. 

* * *

(Once upon a time, they were thought to be inseparable.

But now, with a decade under their belt and the bonds that were once there now torn at the seams, it occurs to Qrow that not all good things were made to last.

It is just him and Taiyang now. Him and Taiyang, him and the girls, him and the flask that acts as the only sense of comfort he has on long days and even longer nights. Him and the burn in his throat and the pit in his chest, because Summer is gone and so is Raven, and Taiyang is no better.

Qrow is the one to bring Taiyang back from wherever he drifts off to. He is the one to hold his wrists and feel the pulse in them, look into his eyes and see the hurt in them, pull him close and guide him back home.

But he is not Raven. He is not Summer. He is not boundless ambition or everlasting warmth, and at this point, he is tired. But he never leaves. Not for long, not permanently, not if he can help it.

Why he stays until he cannot, why he tries until it begins to hurt, he is not entirely sure anymore.)

* * *

One of the last promises he makes is to Summer.

There are fleeting promises that follow afterwards, of course. There are whispers lost to the wind and patterned echoes that fade into the night, and he keeps those, as well.

But one of the last promises he makes to any of his teammates is to Summer.

From the very start, her promises are always too sunny to believe, too determined to enjoy, too far-reaching for him and his twin to dare entertain. But that’s the fun in promises, Summer used to always tell him, it’s fun to tie useless flowers to their fingers and point out uncaring stars in a crystalline sky.

So the moment she asks him, late into the night with the stars nowhere in sight and Taiyang sitting by an opened window with a lone feather in his fingers, he knows that something is off. She looks just about ready to break, but so does Taiyang, and so does he; all of them are missing a part of themselves, long gone out of an open window with feathers and a titanium ring left behind.

Raven is gone, and now, all Summer can do is ask, “Promise you’ll always come back?”

Qrow blinks. His flask is a cold weight in his breast pocket, and he pauses in the middle of reaching for it. This would not be the first night that he leaves to try to find his other half. This would not be the first time that he searches for hours, wonders for hours, flies and perches and hurts for _hours,_ but it would be the first time that Summer finds him before he does.

“You know I will,” Qrow answers.

Something flits just beneath the surface, something like pain, something like disbelief, but Summer accepts it all the same. She lets him go, and fleetingly, he thinks to ask her why. Why she suddenly asks him, why something that is a given should be promised, why she looks so wounded even when she goes to soothe Taiyang.

It does not occur to Qrow until much later that he should have made Summer promise the same in return, even if a part of him knows that it would have been yet another promise made to be broken.


	2. family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the times where taiyang keeps them together and the times where he cannot prevent them from falling apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: implied suicide attempt & major character injury

The four of them did not fit perfectly together from the very start.

Rather, they came together like jagged-edged shards of glass left to heat, held in place until they finally moulded into one.

The twins were the hardest to get to. It is almost unnerving how closely woven they are into one another, but Taiyang supposes that is what happens when they have had nothing but each other. When they were not abandoned to the wolves but also left to their own devices, when they were brought into this world and told from the moment they could understand to _survive_.

For a while, there is always that barrier there that neither Taiyang nor Summer know how to breach. For months, there is always that lake water silence between them, the quietude that Taiyang knows not to break, the distance that Summer does not know how to close.

But like all things, even the twins are prone to change, and it starts with an argument.

It starts in their shared bunk bed the day before a test - Raven too frustrated, Qrow too weary. It ends with Raven jumping from the top bunk and storming out, books and papers and pencils left behind, and Qrow looking downtrodden because he could not help her understand.

Taiyang learns very quickly that Qrow hides a flask in his nightstand. What he does not learn until it is too late is to go after Raven before she disappears for the night without a trace.

Before then, it is deathly silent. Qrow hides on the top bunk and sits still, so still, still and silent and clutching a flask in a white-knuckled grip. Where he got it, no one knows; who enables him, no one dares to ask. Eventually, Taiyang notices the tremor in his hands, and so does Summer.

Interestingly enough, Qrow does not protest when Summer coaxes him out from the top bunk. He quakes just so, stares blankly ahead, takes a steady breath as Summer takes one of his hands in hers.

“She’ll come back,” Taiyang eventually tells him, because it seems like the right thing to say.

He knows nothing about them. He knows nothing about the twins or where they come from, what their family was like or if they had one - all he knows is that Raven is always there, and Qrow is never very far behind. He does not immediately understand it. What he thinks of when it comes to family, when it comes to bonds and unconditional love and unspoken promises, that is not what he sees.

Eventually, he does, but that is not what comes first.

What comes first is the understanding that Qrow does not want to be forgotten, and all it takes is that small bit of reassurance for Qrow to actually _look at him_ for the first time. All it takes is for Summer’s small hum of agreement and her hand squeezing Qrow’s for him to nod in some weak, hopeful acceptance.

It gets easier to break the ice from that point onwards.

* * *

(There is bitter familiarity when Raven finally leaves.

Taiyang should have known from the very first instance where she disappeared into Ozpin’s office early into the evening.

For a small while, he gets to hold something precarious in his hands - something small, something fragile, something that shattered the moment Yang was born. He gets to cling desperately to the silver lining of a picket-fence family that he genuinely thinks is the finish line before it is ripped out of his grasp.

Now all he has left are feathers on the windowsill and a titanium ring on his nightstand. All he has are echo memories and soothing words from Summer and Qrow that feel like a thin bandage over a gaping wound.)

* * *

Taiyang is not used to holding them together.

Usually, it is Summer, but she is incapable of it at the moment. She is strong - stronger than all of them, Taiyang sometimes reckons - but now, she looks anything but.

For a while, Taiyang is the only one who stays with her. He does not like the burn of the fluorescent lights in his eyes or the heart rate monitor that rings like a bell in his ears, but he will not let her wake up alone. It takes an ungodly amount of coaxing, but eventually, he convinces Raven to stay, and soon after, Qrow follows.

It takes Taiyang’s hand on his shoulder and Raven’s scrutinizing gaze on him for Qrow to stay long enough to see Summer when she finally wakes.

There is some kind of healing that comes with silver eyes fluttering open and the faintest groan as she stirs. There is healing seeing the life still there, the color slowly blossoming back into her skin, the flicker of Aura as it slowly pieces itself back together. There is relief that Taiyang recognizes when Qrow sees her, even if he leaves soon after, even if looks horribly wounded.

Taiyang does not blame him for leaving. What he sees is enough to replace what was there before, and that is all he needs; he sees white no longer blotted red, skin no longer mottled black, fabric no longer moulding with flesh, and that is all he needs to put himself back together.

Taiyang will look for him later. He has already learned their tells, their habits - Qrow runs, but never for long and never very far. He runs, and he hides, and later, Taiyang knows he will be soothing a lone, shivering crow nestled in his blankets. Later, he knows the four of them will heal slowly together, just as they always do.

For the first time, Taiyang fleetingly thinks that this can be something like a family; or at the very least, they must be something more than just teammates when they always heal slowly together. Always healing, always hoping, always refusing to pin the blame, because there is no one to blame for this. There is no one to ostracize, even if Qrow insists that it is his fault, even if Raven does not outwardly disagree with him. 

Later, Taiyang will deal with them.

For now, he tells Summer that it will be all right while Raven gets her to stop moving.

* * *

(Summer is the second to leave.

Taiyang should have known from the very first time he caught the silver gleam of Ruby’s eyes.

For a small while, he gets to live in an everlasting summer by her and Qrow’s side. He gets to reimagine his view on what family is, what it means, what holds them together, if not by blood or by obligation. There is something fragile there, as well, but not in the same way the balance with Raven was fragile; there is something that looms, something that not even Qrow could figure out, and neither of them were prepared for Summer’s Scroll to suddenly go offline.

Now all he has left are rose bushes in the backyard and an engraved ring that he could not find in himself to give her just yet. All he has are whispers of regret to keep him company late at night and a perpetually drunk brother in law who never sticks around for very long.)

* * *

For the first time, Summer does not know what to do.

She trembles and stares at her clasped hands and does not say a word. Raven returns after some time, paler than she’s ever looked, eyes the same red that Taiyang wishes did not stain his hands, his shirt, his cargo shorts. He has already showered and changed, but nothing soothes the scent of iron in his nostrils and the memory of slick warmth on his skin.

Raven does not say a word that night, either. There are no words to be had, because if someone opens their mouth, there might be blame. There might be wondering, questioning, constant reiterations of what-if and if-only, and for once, Taiyang is happy for the silence.

He has not moved from where he sits, because from the moment he walked back into their dorm, Summer asked him not to leave. She asked him what Raven could not ask him, asked him to stay and keep a lookout for any word on their teammate, their _friend,_ and he will keep that vigil for as long as he has to.

He does not sleep that night, because if he closes his eyes for too long, he can still see the stains on Harbinger. But Summer does. Summer falls asleep with dry patches under her eyes, and that is when Raven finally says, “You didn’t have to.”

Taiyang glances sharply over to her. Her face is unreadable, her voice inscrutable, facing out the window and into the desolate night. It is the first time anyone has spoken in hours, and it would be jarring were it not for the soft, barely audible murmur of her voice. 

Incredulously, he points out, “I couldn’t just _leave him_.”

He almost flinches, because it is the first time that night that any of them addressed what happened. It is the first time that he allowed himself to finally think about it, because nothing would be the same. Nothing would be _them_ \- nothing can replace or replicate their bond, their friendship, their _family_ if Qrow -

“You could have,” Raven quietly tells him, “but you didn’t.” She turns to him, her eyes a glistening red like the thick ribbon that once wept vertically down Qrow’s wrist. “Thank you.”

It is the closest to breaking he has ever seen her, and the longest she has ever stayed with them - one hand in Summer’s to soothe her, the other tapping mindlessly against the edge of her seat while they wait to be called back.

* * *

(Qrow is the last.

Taiyang always knew that he would not stay for long, but he never expected it to go like this.

For a long while, he relearns what it means to be a family. It is not the most conventional family, and it is not the first idea that ever came to mind, but they are their own family. A renewed version of it, nothing like the family he had in Beacon but something uniquely their own. Each visit becomes just a little bit shorter, and the gaps in between become just a little bit longer, until finally, Beacon falls.

Until finally, Qrow leaves to find Ruby, and is nowhere to be found for the next two years.

Taiyang waits for two years. Two years of worrying, two years of wondering, two years spent anticipating a letter from either of his daughters or from the only bit of history he has left.

He should have known not to keep his hopes up for so long.)

* * *

On the day of their graduation, Summer gives them all matching rings.

On the day of their graduation, they talk endlessly about the plans they have, the paths they wish to take, and somehow, they all manage to fit together.

Raven scoffs, but does not shy away when Summer wraps her arms around her middle and tugs her closer to the pillow pile Taiyang threw together. Qrow looks oddly wounded, but whatever wound there is seems to mend and soothe itself as the night progresses. It hits Taiyang then, with the four of them together, matching rings and matching dreams and matching laughs while they reminisce in the dark, that they’ve become something of a family.

It is a family bound together by hardship rather than blood, by experience rather than obligation, by love rather than expectation. That is what this is, Taiyang thinks as he sees the other three smile their own weary smiles. Perhaps this is not what he originally thought family to be, but that is the best way to call it - _family._

He presses his thumb against the smooth, engraved curve of the ring around one finger. He glances to the others - to the ring Qrow also wears, the ring Raven strung into a necklace, the ring that Summer is toying with as she speaks - and knows that this is the family he has been searching for.


	3. out of hell, finally

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the day raven refused to leave and the night she finally did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: major character injury

She could leave them.

Her breaths rattle in her chest, against her ribs, white-hot where the splintered edge of one pierces her lung. Every movement is a knife-jab in the deepest parts of her, every breath a flare of fire that stems as deep as the linings of her lungs, but she has to. She has to do this, has to even if the tears fall thick and hot down her stained cheeks, even if Omen grows heavier by the second.

Qrow is there, no longer unconscious in her arms but laying against the cold, unyielding ground. His hand is limp in hers, his skin paler than she remembers. Harbinger is close to his other hand, his fingers laying over its hilt rather than gripping it, perhaps the only comfort he knows that is not tied to a flask or to Raven. He lays very still with thin wheezing breaths and a shallow rise and fall of his chest that Raven watches closely, wondering what might be bruised, what might be broken, what might be punctured within. 

She watches long enough to deem it safe to leave him. He will not wake anytime soon, but it would be just her luck - just _his_ wretched luck, really, him and his curse and his insistence that nothing is wrong - if he were to wake up and find himself alone. The last thing she needs is him following. The last thing anyone needs is him with frantic breaths and whited eyes trying desperately to find where the rest of them are even if it hurts him to.

His Aura has long since shattered, and soon hers will, as well. It already shimmers, already sparks, already dangerously low but still strong enough to open a couple of portals if she tries. If she is lucky. If she is nowhere near him. But she glances down to him, to bruises and splintered bones and lungs probably already filtering through blood, and thinks.

If her Aura holds, the both of them could leave right now; if it breaks, all four of them will stay.

She could leave this hell, she idly thinks when she numbness in her fingers starts to set in. She squeezes his hand even if she cannot feel it, even if he will not respond to it. She glances upwards into the abyss of the surrounding forest, strains to hear anything, but the silence does not waver.

She could leave, but she does not.

* * *

(She has never felt more fragile than this.

She has been fragile before. She has been broken before, laid bare before, bleeding and weeping and sobbing out unbidden before, but it was never like this.

Never like the bundle in her arms.

Never like Qrow at her side that night.

She does not know what it is that lingers in his eyes. She does not know what it is about Taiyang at his side that makes her ache. She does not know, but she knows what it is in his voice when he deadpans, “Why?”)

* * *

It is painfully ironic.

Three years ago, she would have left. Three years ago, she would have taken Qrow and run in the opposite direction, but at this point, she has forgotten how to run. That is the one skill she has always had, but there is no running, anymore.

There is no running for very long when Taiyang is always there to call her back, or when Summer always nods and smiles and says that she understands. When Qrow is always there, as well, quiet and glassy-eyed, never saying a word but embracing her all the same. There can never be any running when there is nothing but understanding, because all she knows how to do is run, and all they know how to do is wait for her to return.

So they wait for her to find them. Or at least, she hopes that they wait for her, wherever they went. She would have taken Qrow with her if she did not fear her Aura shattering, and it almost hurts more than the broken rib to leave him behind.

The forest is silent and desolate, but at this point, she considers that a good thing. There are no longer tremors of a stampede or cries of Grimm she never knew existed. She follows the trail of ashes left behind, growing thicker the further she goes. She ignores the large silhouette on the way, curved with a bloodstained tusk that has yet to start fraying in the wind, as well.

There is red weeping from her temple and down the cut of her jaw, a persistent drip drip drip onto her clothes that are already crimson. No one will notice, just as they will not notice the bruises blossoming down her rib cage, but that is fine.

She is used to masking the wounds long enough for the others to heal first.

She is used to her own hands stained red and her skin mottled purple for the longest out of all of them. It is fine as long as her Aura does not break, as long as it shimmers and glitters but never shatters.

As long as her only way out of this hell is not taken from her.

* * *

(They used to be one and the same.

Two halves of one whole, two pieces crafted to fit, two patterned edges sewn from one another.

Now, she does not recognize him.

Now, she does not know what to say to him.

“You don’t understand,” she says. Her voice is thin, airy, worn ragged from the screaming, the shaking, the struggle that Taiyang never once left her to deal with alone.)

* * *

She finds Taiyang first.

She almost does not recognize him.

Taiyang is there, once as fierce as the wildfire in her veins, as bright as the stars above, as golden and everlasting as the sun that bleeds in the sky. Now he is almost as ashen as Summer, one of her arms slung over his shoulder while the other hangs limp at her side. 

Raven does her best to ignore the missing gauntlet, the torn sleeve, the skin of her wrist that almost tints black around the distortion in it. She does her best to pretend that the silhouettes aren’t around them, either. There are trees crushed under their crystallized feet, and the air is still, no longer filled with ashes because Summer’s eyes never leave corpses.

“Where’s Qrow?” Taiyang rasps.

Somehow, he pales further when Raven does not answer. But even if Qrow is alone, even if the surrounding silence is like that of the stillness in the eye of a storm, Raven _knows_ that he is fine. She feels him just as he feels the other two, something innate, something tied to her core, something that thrums in her blood with _life_. Thin, feeble, but life nonetheless, and even if it does not get stronger, it also does not get any weaker.

But Taiyang never quite understood that.

“Where is he?”

The question is weak, and Raven hates that it is. Hates that his voice doesn’t match his eyes - hates the thunderstorm that still brews in them, the ocean sink waiting to swallow her, the blue of a late summer twilight that bleeds of strength and love and _life_. Hates that he even bothers to ask, because the question should be obvious. Where is Qrow if he is not with Raven, where does Qrow ever stay if Raven is not there to keep him safe?

“Rae,” he says. Pleads. She hates that, as well. Hates the nickname, hates that it always gets him what he wants, hates that he only ever uses it when he needs to. “Where is he?”

If there is one reason why she tolerates Taiyang the most out of all of them, it is because of this.

It is because she knows she can trust him. It is because she knows that he would shatter the moon anew if it was to keep Qrow safe.

* * *

(Once upon a time, she would have never left them.

Once upon a time, she did not know what it was at stake.

To her, it is no secret why Summer glances in a mirror with a vein deep melancholy that not even Taiyang knows how to alleviate. It is no secret why they were given wings. It is no secret what inevitability will come for them all, and it has never been a secret that Summer is frighteningly good at biting off more than she can chew.

But Qrow sees none of it, and it is too late for Raven to save him.

She might have still tried once upon a time. She might have, but all she knows is how to run, and all Qrow knows is how to keep coming back, and there is no changing that.

Once upon a time, she might have tried to say something before she left this fresh hell waiting for the right moment to pounce.

Once upon a time, he might have listened.)

* * *

In the end, Taiyang carries them both.

Raven does not necessarily let him, moreso that she simply loses the will to fight him. She is strong enough until her legs are too numb and her breaths rattle too loudly, but what makes the decision for her is the trip over a root that had her crumbling to her knees.

She would have protested to Taiyang hauling her along if her Aura didn’t spark like a perilous hit of flint to steel, threatening to shatter and leave them all stranded if she strains any longer. Her vision frays around the edges before it begins to slip and blot red. She knows she is running on sparks, on fumes, on the shimmering remains of Aura that might not even be enough for a single portal.

But in the end, it is.

In the end, with Taiyang’s hand helping her lift Omen, it is just enough to tear a portal open in the veil of the night that will take them home.

Her Aura shatters the moment they emerge on the other side, but that is fine. Her vision slips, ears ring, lungs shudder against bone and blood and white-hot pain down her spine, but that is also fine.

They are finally out of that hell, and that is all that matters.


	4. happy endings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the times summer found a reason to stay and the day where those reasons were not enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the loosest interpretation of a prompt you've ever seen, with a pinch of fluff as an apology.
> 
> also, this one's more summer & qrow heavy than anything, but y'know. the other two are fleetingly there so it counts in my book.
> 
> cw: alcohol abuse/alcoholism

It does not happen during the winter.

Summer glances fleetingly from one eye to the other in the mirror. There is a glisten to them that is not from the fluorescent lights, fading quickly after she blinks it away. They are something of a fairy tale, something far-fetched and obscure, the magic to them believable only because she reaped the benefits of them. Once upon a time, like the twins with their wings, she considered them a blessing.

Once upon a time, she considered them something of a gateway to a happy ending.

In a way, they still are, though the thought is more terrifying that it has the right to be. She has always known, but it was never as obvious as it is now. Her gaze shifts over her shoulder towards the bathroom door she left ajar, and in the void of the bedroom, there is nothing but silence. There is peace for the first time in what felt like hours. There is Taiyang nodding off where he lays back against the headboard, Ruby cradled against his chest, finally asleep after endless fussing.

There is Qrow right behind her, Yang propped on his hip, fast asleep with her head tucked against the crook of his neck.

“What’re you planning?”

Qrow’s voice is hushed, gentle in the silence of the night, but even with her back turned towards him, she recognizes the tension. Through the mirror, she sees the way he sets his jaw, the calculating stillness in him, the eyes that narrow just so. Even now that they are apart, she sees Raven in him, with a gaze sharper than Harbinger and a mask that she still struggles to decipher.

“Nothing much,” Summer hums.

He does not look convinced in the slightest.

* * *

It does not happen during spring, either.

But Summer has known since the first time she saw Ruby’s eyes. 

They are identical. They are not gray but not white, wide and bright, not mechanical but not something wholly natural, either. They are more than she is prepared to handle just yet, more than she knows how to express when Taiyang asks why she is crying, more than she is willing to voice when she sees the knowing melancholy on Ozpin’s face when he sees for himself.

The whisper-light winter is just about ready to break. The snow is no longer soft and powdery, shifting gradually into something slick and hard and ready to melt as the days rapidly give way into a heady spring. It is on one of those early, hazel-tinted mornings that Summer speaks to Ozpin for the final time.

She does not say that it is the final time, but something tells her by the end of that visit that he knows.

And if he does, he also knows that it is not his place to stop her.

She is awake to watch the sunrise, and she is awake much later when it begins to set once more. Triumphs of the day echo out over the horizon before it falls into another brief slumber, and nearby, Qrow is there again. His words are not slurred, and his shirt is not stained, and the flask is nowhere in sight as he plays peek-a-boo with Ruby.

It would be Taiyang, but he needs a break. It would be him, but he is upstairs trying to forget. It would be him, but a raven on a tree branch just outside their home made him remember, and only silence helps him now.

Only time mends that kind of wound. Only patience heals that kind of ache. Though Summer wonders if it will ever truly heal when there is a hole that refuses to fill in all of them. In Taiyang, who loves them all unconditionally and wishes he knew what to say. In Qrow, who still periodically disappears to presumably find his other half. 

In her, when she lays awake at night and wonders if Raven will know when the time comes.

They used to talk about it often. Happily ever afters and springtime promises, long lives spent in quietude and late autumn mornings together when they found the time. Looking back at it, Summer realizes that it was mostly her and Taiyang rambling, with the occasional scoff and fond eye roll from Raven.

She glances back to Qrow. He is not smiling, but it is close, the slight crook on his lips, hitching just a bit higher at Ruby’s bubbly laughter. In a way, she is reminded of Raven. On the first night she held Yang, smiling just the barest amount, smiling that not-smile of hers with an uncharacteristic glisten in her eye. Something in Summer aches in the same way a bandaged wound aches - something pulsing, pounding, wrenching beneath her skin, and already, she knows she cannot leave yet.

She knows delaying the inevitable never helped anything, either, but if it means that Taiyang will have a chance to heal and Qrow will have a chance to stop running, she will take it.

“Hey, you.”

He looks up. Already, he knows that something is off, just as he did all those months ago. “What?”

“No matter what,” Summer carefully says, “I want you to stick around. Maybe not for long, or not often, but still - you’re family to us. To them.”

Qrow does not answer. Not that she expects him to - family was always a convoluted concept to the twins, and furthermore, she cannot tie a jess around his ankle to keep him from running. Restraints are not what will call him home; it is choice that will bring him back, and all she can do is hope. Hope like she does for Ruby to stay out of this mess. Hope like Taiyang does for Raven to change her mind.

Qrow turns his attention back towards Ruby, who is grasping idly at one of his fingers. He moves to curl his hands around her own. He cradles them as if he is holding glass made out of starlight or a feather weaved from stardust, and that is how Summer knows he will not run any further than he has to. 

Finally, he murmurs, “Maybe.”

* * *

It does not happen during the summer.

It could not have happened even if Summer tried.

Qrow is gone for most of the day, searching endlessly even if they all know it will never result in anything, but he arrives once the sun has already set. Nameless parents, friends, neighbors, all of them chatting, none of them caring for the streamers that crunch under their feet or the copious amount of balloons strung up against the walls.

They are not what Summer focuses on. What draws her eyes like moths to the flame are her friends. Her partners. Her family.

To Taiyang, who has Yang on his hip and dances in mindless circles while he sings her happy birthday. To Qrow, who is endlessly amused by the stars in Ruby’s eyes once he finally lights the candles. To the raven she finds outside later that night, plucking idly at stray streamers before it disappears once more.

Maybe this is the happy ending she and Taiyang kept talking about. Maybe this is the happily ever after that they have always yearned for. Maybe this is what she kept reassuring the twins that they would one day see for themselves, this security, this levity, this peace.

But it takes one glance at Taiyang’s weapons held ready at his bedside, one look at the flask in Qrow’s pocket, one fleeting moment to consider the thing that Raven keeps running from, and she knows that this is not the finish line.

But there is a finish line. There is a potential end, if she can manage it.

If her eyes are the answer that she hoped they would be.

* * *

It happens suddenly as autumn sets.

It happens as suddenly as the storm that day - loud, tumultuous, crashing against the walls and the rooftop and the windows until Summer is sure they will break. Her rucksack is pitifully light, her weapons hidden by her cloak, her scroll alight with the details to the mission she is supposed to embark on when the sun rises.

“You’ll take care of them.”

Qrow laughs. If it were any other night, she would be angry that he came to them smelling like whiskey. But tonight, all she can do is offer him a towel and hope that he will take it.

“How do you know that?” he rasps out. His eyes are hazy, but at the very least, not unbearably so. His hands are quaking, his shoulders are stiff, but both are as faint as the alcohol in his breath. “How do you know I won’t hurt them?”

 _Like everyone else_ , he might say, but it hangs in the air, stinging like static left to jumble and fester. Summer does not remember the last time she saw him without a flask. She does not remember the last time she saw him without Harbinger at his side, either.

It is unsheathed, a lethal allure to it like Omen once had, propped up haphazardly against the wall and dripping with rainwater. It is no secret what he had to do on the way back to them. It is no secret that he is barely holding himself together, partially because Summer is there, mostly because Yang is nearby hiding beneath a blanket and Taiyang is just in the other room soothing Ruby.

It is no secret why he is not as drunk as he wishes to be, even when he trembles, even when he fights to keep from running. Where he went, Summer is not entirely sure, but at the same time, it is no secret who it is left out there that makes him this fragile. Something about that makes her feel fragile, as well, ringing like glass about to shatter at the prospect of someone so dear being so close by. 

Always lingering, always hiding, always out of reach. Always _Raven_.

“They love you,” Summer quietly tells him, “and you love them.”

Qrow looks over to where light spills out from the kitchen, to where Taiyang’s voice carries through over the low growl of thunder overhead. He is no doubt finding comfort in the idea that she will only be gone for a couple of weeks at the latest. She knows he will stay, knows he loves the girls as much as he loves them, knows in her heart that he will do what he can.

That is just who he is - he is one to keep his promises, and he has made that promise a long time ago. But everyone needs a reminder, and he is already close to breaking, and so is she as she says, “Tai loves you. I love you.”

He blinks. Even through the alcohol, the clouds in his head and the gleam in his eyes, he registers that something is off. He is dreadfully observant, that much she knows, and it is dreadfully characteristic of him to rasp, “What - what’s that supposed to mean? Why are you talking like that?” 

“I just feel like I don’t say it enough,” Summer answers.

It is the truth, even if the mission details are ones she will ignore. It is the truth, even if the sentiment comes out often from her and Taiyang both, even if Qrow has never once returned it verbally. She would say it a thousand times over if she could, a lifetime of words that he will only ever return in his own way, but she does not have that time.

She only has a bargaining chip and the hope that it will pave the way to the happy ending her family deserves.

Qrow shakes his head. He sways just a little at the action, but he straightens, steps closer, drips frustration like he does rainwater as he demands, “What’re you planning, Summer?”

She smiles, partially because she knows she will never get a chance to again, but mostly because she means it. Just as any other time, she reaches up to flick him on the nose, and he jerks back, blinking incredulously at her. 

“Don’t worry so much,” she hums.

Qrow wavers for a few more atmosphere-heavy moments before he finally accepts it.

* * *

A part of her is relieved that he did.

It hurts in the same way that a still-bleeding wound does, dim and constant and growing as distant as she does.

But as she thinks about happy endings and family and dreaded nights to come, as she prays and pleads as desperately as the hummingbird-flutter of her heart, another part of her is terrified that he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading ♡
> 
> come say hello to me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/ospreyxxx) ✨


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